I-SS Board of Education to vote on location of new high school at monthly meeting

The Iredell-Statesville Schools Board of Education is set to vote on the location of the new high school in southern Iredell County at Monday’s monthly meeting.

The $80 million new high school will be funded through the 2020 school bond that was approved by Iredell residents in a March referendum.

I-SS has two options for the location of the new high school: 106 acres off Overcash Road and 85 acres off Parkertown Road. Both locations are in Troutman.

I-SS is currently recommending the land off Overcash Road because of favorable watershed restrictions and ease of access to water and sewer, a letter written to the board from Kenny Miller, assistant superintendent for facilities and planning, read.

Miller wrote that the decision needs to be made as soon as possible.

“We do not know the impact economically which will definitely affect available resources and potentially future projects,” Miller wrote.

In other business:

» Board members will vote on $100,000 in allocation of emergency funds for COVID-19 from the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction.

The $100,000 will fund 45 additional MacBooks and 75 iPads to replace lost or damaged devices. It will also fund chargers and parts for repairs for the devices.

It will also fund personal protection equipment such as masks and gloves for use by the technology team during device collection.

» Board members will also vote on whether to continue to use Filewave Device Management Software for managing the district’s 17,500 devices.

The software is used to monitor device usage, deploy updates and shut down devices that have been lost of stolen, a letter written to the board from David Edwards, executive director of technology and media services, read.

The annual fee for the software is $128,844.

» Board members will vote on bids for the district phone contract. There are four bidders: CFP Technologies, York Communications, Windstream and Spectrum.

“Based upon pricing, scope, and overall benefit to the I-SS district, we are recommending the bid be awarded to York Communications. Their bid was a $10,298 one-time, non-recurring costs and a monthly recurring cost of $5,430.64,” Edwards wrote in a letter to the board.

» Board members will vote on hiring an attorney to represent the board in any potential pension spiking litigation.

Melissa Wike, I-SS chief financial officer, wrote in a letter that I-SS should join other North Carolina districts in litigating against the North Carolina Retirement System as a cost-saving measure.

Wike wrote that one or more current or former employees may trigger requirements set by rules adopted for the North Carolina Retirement System for I-SS to pay funds to the Retirement System covering a perceived shortfall in employee contributions for those employees.

“If successful, it would be our hope that hundreds of thousands of taxpayer’s dollars could be saved by avoiding or doing away with the Retirement System’s arbitrary rules,” Wike wrote.